Perpetual Nightmare
by Tayjena
Summary: SPOILERS for chapter 364. Kyoraku is trapped in his own nightmare while Ukitake is powerless to do anything but watch helplessly. Shounen Ai


Title: Perpetual Nightmare

Author: Tayjena

Rating: PG

Pairing: Kyoraku/Ukitake

Warning: SPOILERS for chapter 364 and beyond, angst, hurt, shounen ai

Summary: Kyoraku is trapped in his own nightmare while Ukitake is powerless to do anything but watch helplessly.

Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach. If I did, do you really think I'd be writing fanfiction?

Notes: This is my first Bleach fanfic, and my first fic in a few years, so please be kind, enjoy and review. Also this isn't Beta'd.

It had happened so fast.

They had been fighting against Starrk, the Primera Espada. The two of them, as a pair, each watching the other's back; fighting together as partners like old times.

And then… Then that Garganta opened.

There had barely even been enough time to wonder what was coming through it. The Fura and other childlike Arrancar stepped out. Ukitake had no doubt been distracted by this, staring at the Fura.

Then Starrk said a name, -one that would now haunt him forever- and it was over. "Wonderweiss."

The child had then moved, before either of them had time to act. He was behind the snowy- haired taichou. Brown eyes were wide as he stared over his shoulder in utter shock, as a hand was protruding out from his chest.

The same chest that caged already weakened lungs. That housed the heart he'd, only a few hours ago, –or was it days ago now? - listened to while its owner slept.

He had felt rage fill him at that point. Nothing else seemed to matter at that point.

Nothing, but Ukitake.

And he turned his attention from Starrk to this Wonderweiss. It was wrong to do such a thing. Wrong to turn his back to an opponent, wrong to worry about a comrade in the middle of battle, he knew all this, somewhere deep within him, Kyoraku knew this.

But it didn't matter.

Ukitake Jushiro was more than simply another comrade. He was his best friend, his partner, his lover.

He felt the gun at his shoulder, heard Starrk's voice, and then felt the Cero blast through said shoulder. But he didn't care. All he could do was stare in horror at the pale body already falling to the ground below them.

Then he'd hit the ground himself. He was prepared to lie there, beside the white-haired taichou, until the end of them both, because he didn't want to move if Jushiro wouldn't.

But then came the non-forgotten and familiar voice of his former fukutaichou, calling him out. He didn't want to move, but he did want to see how much she'd grown since they'd last seen each other. And he knew Jushiro would never forgive him if he pretended to die while everyone else was giving their all.

He didn't look at the other taichou as he made up his mind. He didn't want to see his body laying broken there on the ground of Karakura town. If he did, he might lose all resolve and gather the smaller man in his arms and give in to grief, and now was not yet time for that.

So he continued his battle, slinking out of the shadows to save the former captains turned visards, Love and Rose, from Starrk, thus finishing the Primera.

Then the fight against Aizen began.

It was only after his part, and to everyone's horror that they've been tricked into attacking Momo instead, that was he struck again. This time it was by Aizen. And this time he hoped he really doesn't wake up again.

This is the nightmare that Kyoraku cannot wake himself from. Though it rarely gets that far, most times as it repeats over and over from the time were everything was well to where it all went horribly, horribly wrong. To the time where he was helpless to watch as his lover was impaled and fell.

Jushiro sat beside Shunsui's bed, the other man's hand tightly grasped in his own. He'd been there for days, watching over the other taichou, calling to him, crying over him, waiting for him to open his eyes.

He'd woken up a few days earlier to find Unohana-taichou leaning over him. Apparently she had made it back from Hueco Mundo just in time to save him and several others. Upon first waking she'd insisted he continue to lie down, but he found himself unable and unwilling to listen. He had the faintest recollection of hearing soutaichou call him and Shunsui as he was falling. Which meant that his partner was also injured., and since the bigger man wasn't at his side when he woke up, like he normally would have been at this point, it meant he was still injured or…

"Sh… Kyoraku-taichou… Where is he?" Jushiro had demanded of the female taichou. She'd chided him, and tried to restrain him, but his persistence wore her down. If anyone knew how deep their relationship really was, it was Retsu. She knew how Kyorake would stay with Ukitake all night long through his worse fits, and constantly worried over the ailed man, maybe more so than she or anyone else did. And it seemed it worked the other way as well. She knew that she wouldn't be able to get Ukitake to rest until he saw the eight squad captain, despite anything she might tell him.

"He's fine, Ukitake-san." She had assured as she lead him through the rumble of the city over to Kyoraku where lie. "Or… I should say physically he's fine. His wounds are healed, but he won't wake up." She had then turned to him and said almost knowingly, "It's like he received some tremendous shock to his system and refuses to wake up… I think another shock like that might do it, but I have no idea what to do."

Jushiro had then moved to the make-shift bed Kyoraku laid on. At that point he didn't care who saw, who found out that they were more than just friends, he just wanted Shunsui to wake up. He had a pretty good guess at what the 'shock' to Shunsui had been, after all, if things had been reversed, it probably would have hit him in the same way. Slowly he'd leaned over, brushing aside dark hair, and whispered into his ear. "Shunsui." He'd let his reiatsu wrap around the unconscious man, hoping to alert him to his presence, and then he'd touched their lips together and pushed all the passion, adoration, love and every other emotion he felt for the other man into it, praying it was enough.

When he'd pulled away, Shunsui had muttered his name, and he'd felt joy swell within his newly healed chest.

But nothing more had come of it.

Shunsui still hadn't opened his eyes.

And now Jushiro sat at his side, refusing to leave him.

"I'm not leaving him. I have to be the first thing he sees _when_ he wakes up. If I'm not he won't believe any of you that I'm alive." That was his response every time someone asked him to come away and get some rest of his own. Most of them didn't understand why he was so adamant, but Unohana did, and let him be.

"Jushiro…" Shunsui whispered again, and despite him doing it several times a day and not waking, Jushiro still felt hope well up in him as he looked down at his lover's face.

"Shunsui." He called back.

Nothing.

And then the tears streamed down from under Shunsui's eyelids and Jushiro sighed sadly and raised a slender hand and brushed away the tears with his thumb. "I'm here Shunsui. I'm here. Please, please wake up."

The nightmare continued in an endless loop again and again deep within Kyoraku Shunsui's consciousness. Over and over he watched as the Garganta was opened and the same small Arrancar stepped out and then appeared behind Jushiro and shoved his hand through the beautiful man he loved more than his own life.

Yet around the fringes of his conscious, he could hear someone calling him, telling him he was still there.

But it refused to listen to it.

It was just a trick of his mind to try and stop the endless cycle.

He just wanted it all to stop. The nightmare, the voice, all of it.

Wanted it all to end.

If Jushiro wasn't alive, he didn't want to be either.

"Not without him… I don't want to live…"

Shunsui's voice startled Jushiro. Not because he'd spoken, but because he'd said more than his name. And Jushiro finally understood why Kyoraku wouldn't open his eyes.

Once again he caught the tears that leaked from his lover's eyes with his thumb, ignoring his own falling in rivers down his cheeks.

Jushiro had been calling for him, telling him over and over that he was there, kissing him, and doing anything he could think of to wake the other man up for days without end.

Slowly he crawled up beside him, laid his head against the chest he'd found comfort in so many times before, and curled around the larger man.

"Shunsui…" He whispered closing his eyes. "I'm here. I'm still here. Don't give up. I'm here… Please… " If Shunsui didn't want to live without him, then it was true that Jushiro didn't want to live without him either. He pressed as close as he could. "I don't want to live without you either.

"If you won't wake up… Then I don't want to either…"

"Jushiro…" Came Shunsui's voice once more, but Jushiro didn't move to see his face and missed the small twitch of the eyelids that had been closed all this time.

Owari


End file.
